There is an influence of Arab cuisine in Spanish cuisine, but one should not ignore Castilian, Leonese, Extremadura, Catalan, Basque, Galician, Navarra, Aragonese cuisine. Andalusian and Valencian cuisines were, those probably yes, more influenced by Arab cuisine.
Las características gastronómicas en la Edad Media encierran un sinnúmero de peculiaridades interesantes, tanto sociales como culturales.
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Descubre la historia del Aceite de Oliva apodado por Homero, hace miles de años como “oro líquido” durante la Grecia Antigua
www.aceitesdeolivadeespana.com
La carne picada moldeada en forma de bolitas era plato de clases sociales altas y no recurso de los menos pudientes.
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The almond was introduced in Spain, according to most studies and sources, the Phoenicians. The Hispania of the Romans already produced and consumed almonds.
Olive oil, wine and salting of fish for preservation were introduced by the Phoenicians. The Romans, Greeks and Phoenicians habitually consumed oil, hundreds of years before the arrival of the Muslims in Spain.
The cane route was born in New Guinea and reached India, from where it extended to China and the Middle East. It was precisely the pioneering Indians who tried its flavor. The first historical references to sugar date back to 4500 BC. Much later, around 510 BC, the sugar reached Persia. Europe arrived in the 4th century BC, thanks to the travels and conquests of Alexander the Great through Asia. Later, the Greeks inherited it from the Romans, who called it "salt of India." In the 7th century of our era, an important milestone in the diffusion of sugar consumption was marked. It is the Arabs, so fond of sweets, who, by invading the Tigris and Euphrates regions, discover the infinite possibilities it presents. These introduce it to recently conquered areas, cultivating sugar cane in Syria, Egypt, Cyprus, Rhodes and all of North Africa. It is precisely there where Egyptian chemists perfect their processing and refine it. The expansion of its consumption continues through the trips of Venetian merchants and a century later, through the Crusades to the Holy Land, this food is known throughout the Christian world.
The artichoke (the name is Arabic) was used by the Greeks and the Romans, who introduced it throughout the Empire. The Arabs popularized it.
The albóndigas (meatball) also has an Arabic name, but they are a popular Roman invention that was already known in Roman Hispania.
It is very easy to fall into admiration for an interesting and highly promoted cuisine and culture today, but there was a previous one, which survived and developed: The cuisine of the convents and monasteries, which were as with the rest of the culture in general, who kept and preserved them for later generations, an identical phenomenon occurred in France with the Cistercian monasteries, which –among other cultural and gastronomic wonders - They created the Bordeaux vineyards and left us their famous wine. A thanks to them!!.
https://www.heraldo.es/noticias/gastronomia/2013/04/21/las-mejores-recetas-de-los-frailes-recogidas-en-un-libro-205917.html
Capuchin eggs or friar's cod are some of the almost 150 recipes collected by the historian and university professor of gastronomy Jaume Fàbrega in his book 'Cuina monàstica' (Monastic cuisine), in which he explains the best dishes prepared in convents and monasteries from Catalonia, Aragon, Castilla, Mallorca, Portugal and Italy.
Fàbrega, author of 65 books and four gastronomic encyclopedias, has captured in 'Cuina monàstica' more than 30 years of research in archives and libraries, where he has documented recipes from the 13th to the 19th century with dishes prepared in monastic pots.
"The friars have always been the best cooks, very good gourmets and thanks to them we have preserved, to a large extent, traditional Mediterranean cuisine," said Fàbrega, who is now immersed in the writing of a book on "aphrodisiac cuisine".
Reviewing the recipes collected, Fàbrega has discovered that "the traditional ones are sometimes more innovative than those of Ferran Adrià, because they propose unusual combinations, such as the aromas of sea and mountains or the imaginative use of spices," he explained.
Perhaps it refers to dishes such as sobrasada with honey, duck with quince, squids stuffed with meat, fish with sweet and sour sauce and nuts ('barborada') or apples stuffed with meat, which are some of the recipes that are detailed in the book.
Fàbrega, who this year has decided to give himself for its 65th anniversary the publication of five books with five different publishers, places 'Cuina monàstica' within a trilogy that completes with 'La cuina marinera de la Costa Brava' (Ed. Farell), and 'L'essència de la cuina catalana' (Ed. Comanegre).
In 'Cuina monàstica' (Ed. Mediterrània), Fàbrega discovers through manuscripts that the friars "were great professional chefs and have meant the continuity of Catalan cuisine". "If it weren't for them, we would have lost her," he explains.
"They are the memory of
Catalan cuisine, which was the first in Europe in the Middle Ages. Already at that time, through the Franciscan Francesc Eiximenis they proposed the first manual of gastronomy and wines in Europe; they link medieval cuisine with modern and lay the foundations for this ", added Fàbrega, professor at the Autonomous University of Barcelona (UAB).
"They were the ones who introduced the products of America, those who have preserved plant species in their gardens, have investigated agriculture and enology, and have exchanged the best seeds among monasteries," he indicated
. "The monks conserved the cultivation of the vineyard and the oenological techniques, we can consider them the custodians of the wine: western cuisine is precisely based on the culture of wine", according to Fàbrega.
"Some orders prevented religious from consuming meat, which was replaced by fish (...) On the other hand, wine was never excluded: being punished for bread and water was the worst punishment that there could be," recalls the gastronomic scholar, who resides in Banyoles (Gerona) and who has documented that the religious "were excellent and refined gourmets, lovers of the most delicious delicacies".
The book, which includes the oldest recipe, from the 13th century, from the monastery of Sant Cugat del Vallès (Barcelona), includes dishes made by Franciscans, Capuchins, Cistercians, Jesuits, Discalced Carmelites, Benedictines and Augustinians.
Fàbrega recalls that the monks have always cultivated their own garden to have quality and fresh products and that they also received, like the feudal lords, products from the farmers, who gave them the best hams, or had rights over fishing, as in the case of the Amer Convent (Girona).
The case of spirits is another example of monastic sybaritism. Fàbrega remembers that the elaboration of distillates was a prerogative of the clergymen because they were thought to be medicinal. The 'Chartreuse', the 'Bénedictine' or the 'Aromas de Montserrat' are some examples of 'religious' liqueurs that are still on the market today.
Isabel Moro tells us about the importance of the gastronomic work that monasteries have had throughout history, turned into great centers of knowledge during medieval times, archives of knowledge (and flavor) of a kitchen forgotten today.
If the cuisine of the popular classes, the vast majority of Extremadurans of all time, has been that reduced pastoral diet reinforced with the winter pout, more or less illustrated by mantanza according to the possibilities of each domestic economy, it existed, as a counterpoint in Extremadura, from the end of the Middle Ages, a gastronomic culture that together with the cuisine of the royal houses, was the pinnacle of European culinary art.
http://www.revistamadreselva.com/38/cocina-de-los-monasterios
The subject of Spanish cuisine is very complex, and it is not possible to speak of a specific influence on our cuisine. Spain is in the Mediterranean, in the Atlantic, near Africa, it receives influences from Greeks, Phoenicians, Romans, Celts, Franks, Nordic and Germanic peoples, and after these from Arabs and Jews. Three different ways of eating and cooking, with three different religions and cultures that impose or suggest different norms, sometimes totally opposite, merge, a very rare phenomenon in the world. During the Arab domination, the Hispanic kingdoms did not lose their cultures, thanks to which some culinary cultural elements could be maintained as before, other times merged and other times mixed to result in something typically Spanish, without being said to be Arab, Jewish or Castilian, it is simply Spanish.
Personal note:
Years ago, since restaurants and cookbooks specialized in themes or cultures began to exist, I began to miss fewer restaurants and books dedicated exclusively to the cuisine of convents and monasteries, which I began to know many years ago and to appreciate. Napoleon also knew it, and more than one famous French recipe was brought to France by his generals, and today they are considered exclusively French ...